HOUSTON -- Jaime Barria triumphed in a pitchers' duel between rookies and Andrelton Simmons crushed a two-run home run as the Angels won their second straight game over the Astros, 3-0, on Friday night at Minute Maid Park.
Barria allowed only three hits over six scoreless innings to best Houston left-hander Framber Valdez, who was charged with one run over five-plus innings. Barria and Valdez were signed by Roman Ocumarez, a former Angels scout who now works in a similar capacity for the Astros.
"I thought he just had better stuff, first of all," manager Mike Scioscia said of Barria. "He had better extension. [Pitching coach] Charlie Nagy has been working with him in his bullpen in between [starts]. It looked like the ball was crisper, truer. He definitely used his fastballs well on both sides of the plate, up and down. He had a good slider and changeup. That's six strong innings he pitched."
Barria and Valdez matched each other with five scoreless innings to start the game, but Valdez was lifted after issuing a leadoff walk to Kole Calhoun in the sixth. Calhoun advanced to second on an errant throw on a pickoff attempt by Collin McHugh, took third on a single by David Fletcher and scored on Michael Trout's sacrifice fly to center field to put the Angels on the board.

Simmons then deposited a 2-0 cutter from McHugh into the left-field bleachers for his ninth home run of the season, extending the Angels' lead to 3-0. Simmons, who also delivered a three-run double in Thursday's series opener, is 9-for-15 with three homers and 10 RBIs in four games at Minute Maid Park this season.
"Simba in this park always seems to come up big," Scioscia said. "That's obviously a big hit for us at the time."

Justin Anderson, Ty Buttrey and Richard Parker combined to pitch the final three innings, securing the Angels' seventh shutout victory of the year.
It was an impressive bounceback effort for Barria, who took the loss in his previous start against the Astros on Saturday after allowing four runs over three innings in his second-shortest outing of the season. Barria said afterward that he thought the Astros were stealing signs after putting runners on second base during the first inning.
"Today, I was locating my pitches," Barria said in Spanish. "I think what went wrong last time was I was going to my slider too soon in the first innings. I made the adjustment, and I threw more fastballs."
The altered game plan resulted in less adversity for Barria on Friday. He opened by striking out the side, whiffing George Springer, Alex Bregman and Jose Altuve on sliders. In the third, Barria yielded back-to-back singles to Martin Maldonado and Springer to put runners on the corners with one out, but he induced a popout from Bregman and a lineout from Altuve to end the inning.

After Correa led off the fourth by beating out a grounder to shortstop for an infield single and advanced to second on a groundout, Barria took a long walk around the mound and appeared to signal to catcher Jose Briceno that they should switch signs. Correa subsequently moved to third on another groundout by Marwin Gonzalez, but Barria left him stranded by getting Yuli Gurriel to fly out to center field.
"They didn't reach second base too often, but we made some adjustments there and changed the signs," Barria said. "More than anything, I attacked the hitters, and that's what was important."
The Angels' rotation has now delivered 12 scoreless innings against the Astros in the first two games of this series.
"I love the way we're pitching," Scioscia said. "We need to set a tone on the mound. We did it last night with [Andrew Heaney], and we did it tonight with Jaime. That's the foundation we have to get back to. It was good to see these last two games."
MOMENT THAT MATTERED
Buttrey dodges trouble: Buttrey was summoned to pitch the eighth, but he fell into a jam after giving up a single to Josh Reddick and a double to pinch-hitter Tony Kemp to put runners on second and third with none out. After striking out Springer, Buttrey walked Bregman to load the bases, bringing the potential go-ahead run to the plate. Still, Buttrey managed to avoid damage by striking out Altuve swinging on a slider and getting Correa to pop out in foul territory.

Buttrey's fastball touched 99.9 mph during his at-bat against Altuve, making it his hardest-thrown pitch in the Majors since debuting with the Angels on Aug. 16.
"Obviously, that's a very good top of the order," Buttrey said. "Those guys are all exceptional hitters, so me being a rookie, I'm just trying to pitch to my strengths. The only thing I can do is go out there and control what I can control. If I go out there and I'm like, 'Oh, I'm facing Altuve and Correa,' and I have that passive mentality in my head, it's going to result in my pitches. It's almost like when the bases got loaded, I was almost trying to do more. Be more aggressive with everything and just try to strike them out and try to get out of that inning."
UP NEXT
Angels right-hander Felix Pena (1-4, 4.52 ERA) will start at 4:10 p.m. PT on Saturday in the third game of the series against the Astros at Minute Maid Park. Righty Josh James will start for Houston in his MLB debut. Pena took a loss in his previous start on Sunday against the Astros after yielding three runs over six innings. He has pitched exactly six innings in each of his past three starts.